Que je me suis baigne."

Her song ended with her work, and as she passed the
strangers, with her two flowing pails of yellow milk,
Riel whispered softly, as he touched her sweet little
hand:

"Ah, ma petite amie!"

The same flash came in her eyes, the same proud blood
mantled through the dusk of her cheek, but she restrained
herself. He was a guest under her father's roof, and she
would suffer the offence to pass. The persistent gallant
was more crest-fallen by this last silent rebuke, than
by the first with its angry words. The first, in his
vanity, he had deemed an outburst of petulance, instead
of an expression of personal dislike, especially as the
girl had so suddenly calmed herself and extended
hospitalities. He gnashed his teeth that a half-breed
girl, in an obscure village, should resent his advances;
he for whom, if his own understanding was to be trusted,
so many bright eyes were languishing. At the evening meal
he received courteous, kindly attention from Marie; but
this was all. He related with much eloquence all that
he had seen in the big world in the East during his school
days, and took good care that his hosts should know how
important a person he was in the colony of Red River. To
his mortification he frequently observed in the midst of
one of his most self-glorifying speeches that the girl's
eyes were abstracted, as if her imagination were wandering.